ANALYSIS: Is the United States ready to deal with Leonid Kuchma? (03/02/03)

ANALYSIS

Is the United States ready to deal with Leonid Kuchma?

by Jan Maksymiuk
RFE/RL Newsline

In its February 8-14 edition, the Kyiv weekly Zerkalo Nedeli reviewed the draft bill "On Social and Legal Guarantees for the President of Ukraine after the Termination of [Presidential] Powers" that was recently registered with the Verkhovna Rada by National Deputy Serhiy Kivalov, whom the weekly called a "man from the presidential entourage." Mr. Kivalov leads the Sea Party of Ukraine and is the rector of the Odesa State Juridical Academy.

The draft bill, which reportedly consists of nine articles, proposes that the state should provide retired presidents with a dacha, car, bodyguards, the right to medical treatment in governmental health-care facilities and a monthly pension equal to 80 percent of the president's average monthly salary.

Article 7 of the draft, titled "The Right for Tax Amnesty," reportedly reads: "The president of Ukraine has the right to tax amnesty that will result in freeing the taxpayer from financial, administrative and criminal responsibility for evading the payment of taxes and failing to declare incomes and hard-currency funds [and] movable and immovable property located both in Ukraine and outside its borders. The president of Ukraine ... shall submit a declaration to the State Tax Administration of Ukraine with information about funds and objects of tax amnesty that will be taken as a taxation basis for calculating tax obligations for future periods. The information contained in the declaration of incomes subject to amnesty is state property [sic] and may not be made public." This article also stipulates that the tax amnesty does not extend to assets defined as illegal by the 1997 international convention on money laundering and that such an amnesty may be granted to the president only once.

Zerkalo Nedeli commented that giving immunity to President Kuchma and his capital would not be a bad idea, as it would obviate the need for Kuchma to install a successor who would provide him with such immunity in the future. Thus, the weekly concluded, Ukraine would have a chance of holding a free and democratic presidential election. However, the weekly also quoted the results of a recent poll by the Oleksander Razumkov Center for Political and Economic Studies, according to which more than 81 percent of respondents are against passing a law that would give Mr. Kuchma immunity from criminal prosecution after the conclusion of his presidential tenure.

It is noteworthy that Our Ukraine leader Viktor Yushchenko, who visited Washington in early February and met with U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney and a number of U.S. congressmen, commented recently that the question of guarantees for President Kuchma "cannot be sidestepped," according to the Our Ukraine press service. Mr. Yushchenko said the goal of such guarantees would be to "return Ukraine to a path of democratic development."

"Most likely, it is necessary to make a political decision on guarantees for the president in order to prevent the past from obscuring [our] attention to the future," Mr. Yushchenko said. "I agree that this topic is becoming more and more urgent. The general background on the eve of the presidential election [in 2004] is certainly comprehensible - everybody on both sides is tired and waiting for changes."

The weekly Grani, which is linked to the Socialist Party of Oleksandr Moroz, made more far-reaching conclusions on February 17, suggesting that the issue of amnesty for Mr. Kuchma upon his departure - not only with regard to his purportedly undeclared capital but also to other issues, including the scandal over Ukraine's alleged sale of a Kolchuga radar system to Iraq and the killing of journalist Heorhiy Gongadze - might have been raised initially by Washington, which is reportedly interested in drawing Ukraine into an anti-Iraq coalition, especially in view of the current opposition of Germany, France and Russia to a possible U.S. military action against Baghdad.

To support its conclusions, "Grani" pointed to the recent change of Mr. Kuchma's tone with regard to the Iraq problem. The weekly stressed that in a joint statement at a recent meeting, President Kuchma and Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski both said they are going "to take specific measures to resolve the Iraq crisis." The weekly quoted Mr. Kuchma's statement last week about Ukraine's readiness to provide an anti-chemical-warfare unit for a possible United Nations-sanctioned mission "on the territory of countries neighboring Iraq."

Grani also noted that U.S. officials have recently fallen silent on the two issues that not so long ago seemed to be of utmost importance for Washington in its relations with Kyiv: the Kolchuha sale allegations and the investigation into the death of Gongadze. According to the weekly, a new geopolitical expediency has forced Washington to set these issues aside and seek "amnesty" for President Kuchma for any unseemly deeds that he might have done or authorized.

It is also strange, Grani opined, that the Paris-based Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on money laundering withdrew its call for international financial sanctions against Ukraine just two months after it was officially voiced. Grani said no serious measures could be taken by international financial institutions within this time to discover whether Ukrainian banks and individuals were actually involved in money-laundering operations, let alone to prevent them. The weekly suggested that the FATF withdrew its recommendation of sanctions against Ukraine under pressure from the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush, which is reportedly seeking to repair relations with President Kuchma in the face of the Iraq crisis.

Grani concluded its article on amnesty for Mr. Kuchma with a half-mocking and half-serious assertion that now, given this new turn in U.S. policies vis-à-vis Mr. Kuchma, the Ukrainian president will not need any legislative "amnesties" and guarantees of immunity because he can easily provide for such guarantees himself by arranging his re-election for a third term.

Jan Maksymiuk is the Belarus, Ukraine and Poland specialist on the staff of RFE/RL Newsline.

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